Books that Stir the Imagination

The following five books were presented by Books of Wonder's founder, Peter Glassman, on *The Martha Stewart Show*. Selected because of their ability to encourage the development of the imagination, they are all great for kids ages 3 to 8.

 

Here is the hilarious companion to the New York Times best-selling books, Diary of a Worm and Diary of a Spider. Fly — who’s good friends with Worm and Spider — lives an incident-filled life, learning to land on moving objects (a child’s head), putting up with her siblings (all 327 of them!), and trying to get all her eyes to point in the same direction for her class picture. Little she may be, but Fly thinks of herself as a superhero. And why not? She’s stronger, pound for pound, than any boxer; has a bigger brain, pound for pound, than Albert Einstein, can walk on walls, change direction faster than the human eye can follow, see in all directions at once, and beat her wings 200 times per second! So what if her brain is the size of a sesame seed and she eats horse manure with her feet? Your children will laugh with delight at Fly’s hilarious take on school, siblings, learning to fly, and becoming a super hero, even as they discover with her that heroes come in all shapes and sizes.

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If you ask his mom who Melvin Bubble is, she’ll tell you he may be the messiest kid in the world, but if you ask his best friend Jimmy, he’ll tell you he’s a really cool guy! Everyone you ask about him — his dad, his dog, Santa Claus, even the big three-eyed monster who lives in Melvin’s closet — has their own opinion. It’s like they’re not even talking about the same person! Former BOOKS of WONDER staff member Nick Bruel brings a six-and-a-half-year-old boy to vibrant life with this wonderfully original book of “interviews,” each offering a unique – and hilarious – perspective of one single boy. Your young readers and listeners will be laughing with glee at all the different ways Melvin is described by the folks who know him, even as they discover that how we see someone — or something — all depends on where we’re coming from.

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Here is a book from this two-time Caldecott Medal-winning author and artist that is sure to bring out the storyteller in any child – or adult! Van Allsburg introduces us to this collection of pictures by “explaining” that they were left with an editor friend of his by an artist named Harris Burdick. It seems Burdick had written 14 stories he wanted to get published and to entice the editor, he left with him 14 full-page stunning black-and-white illustrations, each with a caption for the drawing and with the title of the story it was to accompany. Unfortunately, Burdick never returned to give the editor his stories. All that are left are these 14 incredible drawings with their evocative captions and imagination-stirring story titles. Your young readers and listeners will be captivated by these haunting, mysterious, and beautiful drawings as they develop their own stories to go with them – and so solve the mysteries that Harris Burdick left. One of our absolutely favorite imagination stretchers!

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Everyone keeps telling the young pig in this book to be careful with the stick he’s carrying, but he just replies, “What stick?” – for to him it’s anything his imagination wants it to be! From a fishing pole to a band majorette’s baton to a paintbrush to a barbell to a sword to fight dragons, this little pig finds that with his imagination he can make his “Not-a-stick” into anything he imagines! Like Harold and the Purple Crayon did 50 years ago, this book uses simple drawings and sparse text to encourage young readers to let their imaginations take them wherever they want to go. Your young readers and listeners will love this little pig’s inventiveness, even as they are inspired to use their imaginations to transform everyday objects around them into wondrous things.

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